Mike Novogratz Attacks Cardano, Hoskinson Quick To Respond
According to Mike Novogratz no-one in his top 20 smartest people knows anyone who is developing on Cardano. He also thinks says that Cardano’s status as “top-three” is not deserved.
Mike Novogratz, the CEO of Galaxy Digital, took a stab at Cardano in a Twitter discussion, saying that 20 of the smartest people he knows see Cardano having no “traction with devs.”
Not true. I spoke to twenty of the smartest people I know in the space, and zero of them saw cardano having traction with devs.
Charles Hoskinson, the CEO of Cardano developer, Input-Output Global (IOG), was quick to respond with an appropriate comeback, saying bankers said similar things about cryptocurrency as a whole.
In the same breath Hoskinson also fired back and declared August 15 “Mike check-in day,” on which we revisit his original comment and presumably confirm how wrong he was.
“Here I can fix this statement for you Mike: “I’ve spoken to twenty of the smartest bankers I know in the space, and zero of them saw cryptocurrencies having any traction” ? we all heard that one
Let’s come back to his tweet every year. We’ll call August 15th, Mike check-in day.”
Here I can fix this statement for you Mike: "I've spoken to twenty of the smartest bankers I know in the space, and zero of them saw cryptocurrencies having any traction" 🙂 we all heard that one
Let's come back to his tweet every year. We'll call August 15th, Mike check-in day https://t.co/sax18Fe7XX
With IOG declaring a definitive date for Alonzo Purple, the final phase of the smart contract rollout, Novogratz may well be eating his words sooner than you think.
Novogratz Takes a Stab at Cardano
The entire incident started seemingly innocently enough when Andrew Steinwold, Managing Partner at Sfermion, an investment fund that specializes in NFTs, asked about Cardano and whether devs are building on it (something he could have easily Googled).
“Why is Cardano the 3rd largest cryptocurrency?? Is there stuff built on Cardano that people are using? (Honest question, I know next to nothing about Cardano).”
Why is Cardano the 3rd largest cryptocurrency??
Is there stuff built on Cardano that people are using?
(Honest question, I know next to nothing about Cardano)
— Andrew "The Metaverse Guy" Steinwold (@AndrewSteinwold) August 14, 2021
Novogratz answered by saying its popularity is a mystery to him. Implying, its status as the third-largest cryptocurrency is unjustified.
At the moment, Binance Coin has reclaimed the third-largest cryptocurrency by market cap, with Cardano approximately $300 million behind.
Novogratz’s comment drew a wave of criticism, with many respondents saying he had not done his research. In turn, Novogratz then cited having spoken with 20 of the smartest people he knows. None of whom confirmed developer interest in Cardano.
Cardano Attraction Among Devs
The fifth round of Catalyst funding ended on July 19 and featured 267 different projects competing for $2 million of funding to build on Cardano.
Project Catalyst refers to a public funding system to drive community innovation on the Cardano blockchain. It works by ADA holders voting on protocols that they wish to see developed.
Funding is provided by “taxing” staking rewards, and the funding pool has grown from an initial $250k at Fund2 (the first “real” funding round, with a technical run-through, and 1 a dress rehearsal), to $2 million in the fifth iteration.
Despite Novogratz’s anecdotal “evidence”, it’s seems clear that devs are building on Cardano. During the mid-month August update, IOG confirmed that Alonzo Purple will ship on September 12.
It’s happening.
We’re targeting 12 September 2021 for the ‘Alonzo’ upgrade, bringing smart contracts to Cardano via a hard fork combinator (HFC) event.
